we a great debt of gratitude to John
Bunyan for the large and the displayed place he has given to Hopeful in
the _Pilgrim's Progress_. The fulness and balance and proportion of the
_Pilgrim's Progress_ are features of that wonderful book far too much
overlooked. So far as my reading goes I do not know any other author who
has at all done the justice to the saving grace of hope that John Bunyan
has done both in his doctrinal and in his allegorical works. Bunyan
stands alone and supreme not only for the insight, and the power with
which he has constructed the character and the career of Hopeful, but
even for having given him the space at all adequate to his merits and his
services. In those eighty-seven so suggestive pages that form the index
to Dr. Thomas Goodwin's works I find some hundred and twenty-four
references to "faith," while there are only two references to "hope." And
that same oversight and neglect runs through all our religious
literature, and I suppose, as a consequence, through all our preaching
too. Now that is not the treatment the Bible gives to this so essential
Christian grace, as any one may see at a glance who takes the trouble to
turn up his Cruden. Hope has a great place alongside of faith and love
in the Holy Scriptures, and it has a correspondingly large and eloquent
place in Bunyan. Now, that being so, why is it that this so great and so
blessed grace has so fallen out of our sermons and out of our hearts? May
God grant that our reading of Hopeful's autobiography and his subsequent
history to-night may do something to restore the blessed grace of hope to
its proper place both in our pulpit and in all our hearts.

To kindle then, to quicken, and to anchor your hope, my brethren, may I
have God's help to speak for a little longer to your hearts concerning
this neglected grace! For, what is hope? Hope is a passion of the soul,
wise or foolish, to be ashamed of or to be proud of, just according to
the thing hoped for, and just according to the grounds of the hope. Hope
is made up of these two ingredients--desire and expectation. What we
greatly desire we take no rest till we find good grounds on which to
build up our expectations of it; and when we have found good grounds for
our expectations, then a glad hope takes possession of our hearts. Now,
to begin with, how is it with your desires? You are afraid to say much
about your expectations and your hopes. Well; let us come to your
he